Wray Castle
Coordinates: 54°24′01″N 02°57′51″W / 54.40028°N 2.96417°W
Wray Castle is a large private house at Claife in the English county of Cumbria, built in the Gothic Revival style in 1840. Today, the castle is used as a training centre, and is not open to the public. But the grounds are freely accessible and renowned for their selection of specimen trees - Wellingtonia, redwood, Ginkgo biloba, weeping lime and varieties of beech.
[edit] Background
The house was originally built for a retired Liverpool surgeon, Dr. James Dawson. who built it along with the neighboring Wray Church using his wife's fortune. After Dawson's death in 1875 the estate was inherited by his nephew, Edward Preston Rawnsley. In 1877 Edward's cousin, Hardwicke Rawnsley, took up the appointment of vicar of Wray Church. In 1929 Wray Castle and 64 acres (260,000 m2) of land were given to the National Trust by Sir Noton and Lady Barclay.
Beatrix Potter summered in the house when she was 16 in 1882. She bought nearby Hill Top in 1905 with royalties from her first few books. She bought considerable tracts of land in the area, including most of the land surrounding Wray Castle, though she never owned the castle itself.
[edit] Legacy
A ship, the Wray Castle, was named for the site. It was one of five large vessels built at the Williamson shipyard at Workington for the Lancaster Shipowners Company, the others were Greystoke Castle, Lancaster Castle, Lowther Castle and Pendragon Castle. The Wray Castle was the fourth, an iron four-master launched in March 1889.
